


Time After Time

by Misty_Reeyus



Category: Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Post-Canon, Temporary Character Death, Timeline Shenanigans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-07
Updated: 2019-11-07
Packaged: 2021-01-24 18:13:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21342547
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Misty_Reeyus/pseuds/Misty_Reeyus
Summary: Lynne dies and meets Sissel—for the first time, and all over again.
Comments: 7
Kudos: 56





	Time After Time

When the telephone starts ringing, Sissel’s immediate reaction is to shift on his bed, bury his head deeper into his front paws, and do his best to ignore the persistent sound. He really doesn’t appreciate being disturbed like this; whoever is calling just ruined a perfectly good catnap. And sure, with his body like it is, he doesn’t actually _need_ to sleep, but he still very much likes to lie still and just let his soul rest for a few hours, thank you very much.

“Hello?” Jowd picks up the phone, pauses to listen to the other end, and when next he speaks, there’s an anxious edge to his tone. “Wha…wait, wait, Cabanela, slow down. What’s wrong?”

_ T__hat_ makes Sissel glance up, and he’s greeted with the sight of Jowd tightly clutching the receiver, brow furrowed with concern and confusion. Sissel promptly exits his body and ghosts his way over, following the path of umbrellas and lamps and picture frames that Jowd set up specifically to provide him easy access to the phone. Sissel zips into the device just in time to hear the tail end of Cabanela’s response:

“—our little Lynne.” Cabanela’s usual cheery drawl is gone; his voice is grim and he sounds choked up, like he’s been crying. “Jowd, she…she’s dead.”

Jowd freezes up.

“Ye gods. No, not…not Lynne.” Jowd’s voice is quivering now, as if he’s about to rip apart at the seams. “H-how did it happen? Was she working a case?”

“No, no, nothing of the sort. She was here at the movie theater and someone came in and pulled out a gun. Our baby…it looks like she rushed him. Somehow she managed to disarm him, but she got shot in the process.”

Jowd remains silent.

“There were no other casualties, because of her.” Cabanela’s words come in conjunction with watery, heaving sobs. “She…she was a hero, Jowd. We always knew she would be.”

Jowd swallows hard, then glances over to the little bed in the corner, where Sissel’s body lies curled up in false sleep. “Cabanela, are you on the scene right now?”

“Yes. But the detectives can take care of things here, so I…I’m taking Lynne-baby down to the mortuary in a few minutes. I thought you might want to come meet me there.”

“Yes. Yes, of course, I’ll be right there.”

“See you then, old friend.”

Cabanela hangs up, leaving Jowd staring at the wall, eyes wide and blank. With the receiver still pressed to his ear, he asks aloud, “Sissel, did you—”

_ I heard everything, _Sissel affirms with a quick dash to the core in Jowd’s head. _I’m heading __over __there __right__ now._

_ Please do,_ Jowd says, and Sissel takes off through the phone lines without another moment’s thought.

* * *

Lynne died as any detective would be proud to die: protecting others.

Cabanela already said as much, but when Sissel jumps back to four minutes before her death, he can see it all for himself. As it turns out, Lynne didn’t simply rush the gunman; rather, she shoved a young boy out of the way and got shot in his place. Then, even with a bullet in her gut, she was able to use the last of her strength to strike her arm against the shooter’s hand, knocking the pistol from his grasp before he could even think of pulling the trigger again. Once disarmed, the man was easily subdued by security guards, but Lynne died from her injury shortly afterwards.

She saved at least one and potentially so many more lives, at the cost of her own.

That’s where this particular puzzle gets tricky, because to save Lynne, Sissel has to either stop her or stop the man with the gun. Which really means: he has to stop the man with the gun, because when Sissel _does_ try stopping Lynne—by flipping a theater seat down to get in her way—he isn’t able to stop the boy getting shot instead. Sissel instantly hits rewind at that; Lynne would never accept being brought back at the expense of innocent lives.

Sissel attempts some other paths. He tries flipping down a nearby seat to distract the shooter, but unfortunately, the man doesn’t notice at all. He tries ghosting into the gun to disable it somehow, but the only Trick he can perform is to fire it himself, which results in the boy getting shot sooner and is no help to anyone. He goes all the way to the lobby in an attempt to alert the security guards before the man even gets inside the theater, but that just results in both of said guards getting gunned down themselves.

It’s official. Sissel is well and truly stuck on this one.

Then, a voice pipes in.

_Woah. _ _I__s that…me?_

The blue flame that is Lynne’s soul has awoken, and Sissel turns to her curiously. He says nothing, simply waits, and after the flame spends some time watching the scene of her death play out, her form begins to shift.

Having realized her true appearance, a familiar redhead stares back at Sissel.

_Wait, I recognize you, _Lynne says._ You’re Detective Jowd’s cat, right? What are you doing here?_

Sissel gives her a blank stare. _Seriously? You’re more concerned with that than with the fact that you’re dead?_

_Well, yeah. Me dying was something I was fully prepared for _ _when I became a detective. But m__y mentor’s cat _ _talking_ _ to me, _ _I _ _definitely wasn’t_ _ prepared for that._

Sissel huffs, though not without fondness. Yep, Lynne is Lynne, no matter what timeline she’s in.

_Timeline? What do you mean by that?_

…Ah. Sissel’s really gotta work on that whole “not broadcasting his thoughts to everyone in the Ghost World” thing.

_Look,_ Sissel tells her, _I get that you have questions, and I’ll answer them as best I can later. But right now, I’m a little busy trying to save your life._

_Save __my life__?_ _You can really do that?_

_I’ve done it before._

_Well, alright then!_ Lynne grins, cheerful and bright. _Get my blood pumping again so you can tell me what the devil is going on here!_

But despite how encouraging it is to have Lynne’s support, it doesn’t really change the fact that Sissel still doesn’t have any idea what could be done here. Or, well, he did see one path, a very obvious path: some soft, gel-like candies that spilled onto the floor—Lynne cuts in to let him know they’re called “gumdrops”—and that are the same shape as the bullet. If they could swap a gumdrop with the bullet at just the right time, Lynne would be unharmed, and the rest would be history.

Problem: Sissel doesn’t have swapping powers, and Missile is no longer able to provide them.

_ Missile?_ Lynne gasps. _As in, __**my dog**__ Missile?_ _What’__s he got to do with this__?!_

Sissel winces. _Oops. Didn’t mean for you to hear that._

Lynne quirks a brow in befuddlement, but thankfully drops the topic for now, returning her focus to the problem at hand. _Well, if a bunch of gumdrops got spilled, maybe some other snacks did too? Could you work with anything like that?_

_Hmm, maybe?_

Sissel watches the playback again, this time focusing his attention on snacks or other objects on the floor and seats. At about two minutes in, Sissel spots a new potential path: one moviegoer spills her popcorn all over an adjacent empty seat. Sissel quickly flips the seat down and then right back up again, the momentum launching several pieces of popcorn high into the air. With careful timing, Sissel is able to follow the trail of kernels straight up to a ceiling light.

There’s a rat up here, scurrying about the rafter beams.

Ohhhhh, yes, Sissel can work with this.

Ghost into a ceiling speaker and Trick by turning up the volume, startling the rat so that it climbs atop a winch. Ghost into the winch and Trick by making it move towards a pipe, letting the rat travel along said pipe towards a valve. Ghost into the valve and Trick by turning it sharply at just the right time, causing the rat to fall from the ceiling—and right onto the shooter’s face.

With the rat scrambling and the gunman screaming, Lynne takes her chance, knocking the gun away, tackling the perp to the floor, and handcuffing him herself. Not even a single bullet is fired, and nobody has to die.

Fate averted.

When Sissel returns to the present, Lynne is being fawned over by Cabanela, and she accepts the attention with a small smile before speaking up. “Um…I’m sorry, Inspector, but may I go home now? I’m kind of tired.”

“Oh, of courrrrse, you must be worn out, baby.” Cabanela reassuringly pats her shoulder. “Go, go, we can get your statement tomorrow. But oh, what _looovely _work you did today.”

Cabanela then dances over to the detectives on scene, and now that she’s alone, Lynne glances around herself hesitantly. If he could, Sissel would go for the new core in her head so that they can talk, but she’s too far away to be reached, so eventually Lynne just looks straight ahead and says aloud to the air, “I’m coming for that explanation, Sissel.” With that, she runs out into the street with a determined look on her face.

Sissel simply sighs before ghosting his way over to the phone.

* * *

Sissel does his best to warn Jowd.

He explains the situation: that Lynne died, and Sissel undid her death, but her soul woke up during the process and now she has a _lot_ of questions. Jowd isn’t exactly happy about that—he’s been determined from the start to keep the past in the past, to protect his loved ones from knowing about the tragedy that was their old lives. But in the end, Jowd assures Sissel that since it couldn’t be helped, he’s just grateful that Lynne is alive.

It’s not a surprise when, about an hour later, Lynne shows up at Jowd’s door. Nor is it a surprise that she comes carrying Missile in her arms.

What _is_ a surprise, though, is that when Jowd opens the door to greet her, she immediately glares at him and says, “You went to jail for five years for something you didn’t do.”

Those words cause Jowd to freeze up entirely in the doorway, so Lynne scoffs and brushes past him to go straight for the living room. Sissel, in his own body, slowly trots towards her, and Lynne smiles, setting Missile down on the floor before patting Sissel on the head.

“So you’re Sissel, huh?” Lynne murmurs. “I’m so glad you figured out who you are. I never would have imagined that you were a _cat_.”

_You remember? _Sissel asks, reaching the core in her head. _You remember the old timeline?_

“Well, it’s not entirely clear,” Lynne replies aloud, scratching the back of her head. “After I left the theater, I just kept getting these…flashes of memories that weren’t mine but also _were_. It’s a huge scramble of bits and pieces that I haven’t fully put together yet, but I think I got the gist.”

_MISS LYNNE!!!_ Missile suddenly butts into the mental end of the conversation, his tail wagging with glee. _Oh, how wonderful it is to talk to you again, __Miss Lynne__! _

Lynne smiles. _Oh, Missile. You’__ve really__ been such a good boy._

_I don’t understand,_ Jowd finally chimes in, having apparently recovered from his earlier shock. _How could Lynne possibly __still __remember?_

Sissel flicks his tail. _Well, s__he has a core __of the dead __now __when she didn’t before__. Maybe that was all she needed to send the memories flooding back?_

_Oh, come on, we’re talking ghost powers!_ Lynne cries._ They don’t have to make sense, and it doesn’t matter how I remember. What matters is that I **do** remember, even if it’s not all entirely clear._ In ghost form, she extends her pointer finger forward. _And you guys need to fill in the blanks for me!_

Even in situations that would baffle or terrify most people, Lynne remains optimistic and cheerful. It’s familiar, and comfortable, and Sissel can’t help but be amused. _Okay, okay. We’ll explain. But first, tell us the parts you __remember clearly._

_Hm__m__m. Okay, so. Detective Jowd got accused of murder _ _but we proved him innocent__, _ _the guy who took me hostage in the park ten years ago was trying to enact a revenge plan on all of us, and there was something in there about meteors and gods?_ _ And also I died, like…three times?_

_ Five times,_ Sissel corrects dryly. _Oh, we__ have a **lot** to catch you up on._

Lynne throws her head back as she laughs, and Sissel gets the feeling that she’s going to be just fine.


End file.
